


Special Delivery

by Vanilla_Phoenix



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: But mostly Lance, Cuddles, Everyone needs a hug in this damn show, Fluff and Angst, Insecurities, Keith cares about everyone, Kind of a slow burn, M/M, Minor Original Character, Mutual Pining, Sexual Tension, Space Gays, just for one chapter, klance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-21
Updated: 2017-10-26
Packaged: 2019-01-03 20:04:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 16,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12153840
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Vanilla_Phoenix/pseuds/Vanilla_Phoenix
Summary: Keith discovers that Lance writes letters to his family when he misses them.So he gets an idea. A good one? Maybe. A stupid one?Absolutely.





	1. Patch Up

"Keith, trust me, I'm completely fine," Lance grumbled, gritting his teeth against the pain.

"You are completely not," Keith replied, shaking a little as he tried to support Lance's weight, stumbling down the corridor. "We have to get you patched up."

Their most recent recon missions hadn't gone as smoothly as they would have liked. The paladins suffered a lot of stress when Pidge's lion was shot down by one of Lotor's ships. The Galra had hacked their cloaking system just as they flew over a large enemy outpost. It wasn't an easy task to ensure the lion's recovery and make sure no one died on top of that. Luckily they had managed to wormhole away fairly quickly, but Pidge as well as Hunk and Allura caught the brunt of the attack. Both Hunk and Allura were on cover fire, and the princess was knocked out in a rough landing. Since they actually went inside to rescue Pidge, both Keith and Lance had suffered a decent amount of injuries, especially Lance. They most certainly would have died if Hunk hadn't busted into the side of the base with his lion to draw some of the fire away. After everyone arrived back, Coran really didn't want every single person in healing pods in case of emergency, so Lance and Keith had to make do. The pair had reached Lance's room and both collapsed to their knees from the exertion. After tossing his helmet to the side. Keith immediately reached over to pull off Lance's armour.

"What-"

"I have to treat that wound or it's going to get infected," Keith told him, pulling the breastplate over his head. He then unzipped the flight suit, careful to peel it gently off around the red and raw cut in his life side. Lance winced through the pain, refusing to acknowledge how bad it was. Keith unzipped a pouch in his suit and took out a roll of bandages and a small bottle of antiseptic. Lance raised an eyebrow.

"Dude what aren't you ready for?"

"Listen, I have to be prepared when I have to take your dumb ass on missions," Keith smirked, tearing a piece of cloth and dabbing it with the clear liquid. Lance snorted, but cut himself off with a pained hiss when Keith pressed the bandage to his side. "Sorry. Are you alright?"

"No," Lance whined. "I'm a delicate flower that must be-"

"Oh shut up, McClain. Hold this here will you?" Keith grabbed his hand and guided it to hold the wad of damp cloth in place. Lance hoped that Keith was too focussed on what he was doing to see him blush. It was very rare that he initiated any sort of physical contact with Lance, and Keith's hands on his bare chest weren't exactly helping him with his feelings. After Keith made sure he could hold the bandage properly, he quickly tossed off his own armour to get to free his hands. After he unzipped his suit and pulled it down to his waist, Lance flashed him a quizzical look. "What?"

"Why are you wearing that?"  
Keith looked down at his black t shirt, still partially tucked under his flight suit.

"Space is cold, dude," he said bluntly, cleaning his hands with the alcohol.

"Well yeah, but you know what, I'm not going to end up with a shirt full of holes," Lance pointed out, gesturing to his injury.

Keith shook his head with a small smile and went back to cleaning his wound. "Speaking of that, I wanted to say thank you."

"What for?"

"Well, you blocked that shot for me. If it had been any closer..." Keith swallowed hard before continuing. "Well, you're lucky it just grazed you. But you saved my back there."

Lance chuckled through the pain. "Well, you threw your sword at that Galra drone that was going to wreck shop on me."

"And you shot those three soldiers that were surrounding me and Pidge."

"The list goes on, man. I've always got your back, ok?"

Even Keith couldn't hold back a smile as the butterflies took flight in his stomach. "Yeah. I know." He let out a long breath as he finished up tying the bandage. "How are you feeling?"

Lance took a shaky breath and gingerly fingered the cloth on his side. "Better. Thanks, Keith."

"You're not done yet." With that, Keith grabbed a fresh piece of sterilized bandage and leaned forward, wiping away the blood from small cuts left by flying pieces of shrapnel. Lance watched the intensity of his magnetic purple eyes as Keith cleaned him up. "There," he said quietly, brushing Lance's hair out of his face. Realizing what he was doing, he jerked his hand away and started to stand up, absently scratching his head.

"Whoa, wait, what are you doing?"

"You're going to go to bed and heal up so you can recover faster. What's the problem?" Keith asked, tying the arms of the suit around his waist.

"You're pretty banged up too," Lance pointed out, gesturing to the scrapes on Keith's face. "At least let me clean you up before you go."

"Lance, I'm fine." With those words, a warm stream of blood trickled down his right temple and Lance immediately grabbed his wrist and pulled him back down. He hastily grabbed some of the bandages to try to stop the bleeding. "I guess not." Lance snickered as he worked away on his head. Holding the wad of cloth in place, he carefully dabbed away a lot of the blood from small cuts on Keith's face. Happening to glance down at his neck, Lance noticed a particularly nasty gash running down from just below his jaw. He swore under his breath and grabbed some more of the cleaning alcohol. Keith gritted his teeth as Lance cleaned his wound, trying to focus on the stinging pain instead of both of his friend's hands on his neck. He was so close that Keith could feel his breath on his skin and he hoped to god that the dim light would hide the blush creeping up his cheeks. The blood had stopped flowing from Keith's head, so Lance tied off the bandage on his neck. "How come you're so good at this?" Keith asked, carefully feeling his own neck. "I had lots of practice because I had literally nothing else to do."

"When you got four siblings dude, you gotta be prepared for literally anything," he told him, starting to treat the cut on his head. "Also, nothing else to do? So you just hurt yourself for fun, is that it?"

"Close enough," Keith chucked, trailing off into a sigh as Lance ran his fingers through his hair. He half-hated himself for being so self indulgent, even for something as simple as medical attention, but he couldn't help it. He closed his eyes and he almost fell into Lance's chest when the boy had finished his work.

"Ok, there you go." Keith reached up to feel the bandages webbing through his thick hair.

"Thanks. You sure you're fine now? Your legs are good as well?"

Lance raised an eyebrow, flashing his trademark smirk. "Can't get enough of this, eh, Kogane?" he asked, gesturing at himself.

"I-you-" Keith spluttered. "Shut up," he finished, standing up quickly.

The paladin just shook his head with a smile as he pushed off the rest of the flight suit and got to his feet, standing in front of him wearing nothing but blue boxer shorts. "But seriously, Keith. Thank you. I would say that I wouldn't have been able to do it without you, but, you know, I probably could have."

"Uh huh. I think I'll let you bleed out next time."

"Aw, don't be like that!" Lance smiled, and clapped a hand on his shoulder. "Get some rest, buddy. I'll see you in the morning."

Keith couldn't help but smile as he watched Lance walk to his bathroom. He was extremely happy with how well they were getting along recently. They fought and coordinated well as partners on missions, and with their new positions on the team, they balanced each other well. Of course they still had their occasional banter, but all the bite was gone from it and Keith actually enjoyed messing around with him. A smile lingered on his face as he picked up his armour pieces lying around the floor. As he stooped to grab his helmet from under Lance's desk, a piece of paper caught his eye. Standing back up, he saw an envelope lying on Lance's desk. Turning on the desk lamp, he could now read the blue ink. The address was scrawled put in the corner and the name in the centre read 'Sophia' followed by a small heart. Keith's heart sank into his stomach. _Of course Lance has a girlfriend back on Earth_ , he thought bitterly. _Why wouldn't he? He was a funny, attractive teenage boy, any girl in their right mind would want to date him._ He leaned in to get a closer look when-

"What are you doing?" Keith's blood ran cold and he whirled around to see Lance standing in the doorway, wearing his robe and clutching a bottle of water. The light from the bathroom cascaded shadows across his face, making his expression unreadable.

"I was just-"

"You should probably go. You need some rest." His voice was forcibly even.

"I-"

"Like now."

Keith turned around and left the room without a second thought, mouth dry from guilt.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Here we diddly darn go here folks, more Voltron goodness comin at ya! Feedback is appreciated as always and I may not be as active due to uni, but imma try and keep myself and you guys afloat with some fluffiness!


	2. Giving Some Space (get it?)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Silence is the most fragile thing in the universe. It can break with a single word.

A few days later, it was lucky that everyone else was still feeling like crap, Keith didn't have to feel as guilty. He would have blamed the fact that they couldn't solidly form Voltron solely on himself, but no one was fully recovered yet. During their training exercises, everyone was fortunate if they could stay on their feet for more than five minutes. With the lions back in their hangars and everyone frustrated and tired, Shiro suggested they take the rest of the day and maybe tomorrow off. Keith just went right back to the training deck, trying to drown out his thoughts.

Lance hadn't so much as spoken to him since the other night, and the abrupt silence had struck him like a blow to the head. It was bizarre to suddenly not hear so much as a comment about his hair from his friend. However, no matter how much the silent treatment bothered him, Keith had no intention of approaching him about it. He had never seen Lance act that way about anything from his personal life, so he gave him space, for both their sakes. Falling to his knees, he realized that he'd been fighting for over four vargas. His bayard clattered to the floor and he took a moment to catch his breath.

"Make sure you don't push yourself too hard." Keith whipped his head around at the familiar voice. Lance was leaning on the doorframe, looking tired and downtrodden, his shoes replaced with his blue lion slippers.

Keith stood up, ignoring his pounding head. "Lance-"

His teammate shushed him. "Hey, hey, wait. I wanted to apologize. I..." he trailed off, shoving his hands in his pockets. "I blocked you out for a little while and I know that's not fair. I was kind of being an idiot about the other day, so I'm sorry about that."

Keith blinked, standing still for a second. He then crossed his arms with a slight smirk. "You apologizing McClain? Never thought I'd live to see the day."

Lance cracked a smile. "Your words cut about as deep as a butter knife, mullet-head."

They stood in silence for a bit, before Keith spoke up, his eyes downcast. "So...is she pretty?"

"What?"

"Sophia." Lance's eyes widened and Keith immediately started to backpedal, panicking at his expression. "I-I'm sorry, I didn't mean to pry, it's just- I was-"

"No, no it's fine," Lance laughed. "I just think she's a little young for you."

Keith furrowed his eyebrows in confusion. "She's what?"

"Although, I can see how you would be intrigued by someone with almost as much of my charm and good looks. It runs in the family you know," Lance winked. "I'd like to say I taught her everything she knows in that department."

Feeling as though a weight had been removed from his back, Keith let out an embarrassed sigh. "She's your sister?"

"Yeah dude!" Lance replied, strolling over to take a seat on a bench off to the side. "Why, who did you think she was?"

"Nothing." Keith pushed his hair out of his eyes. "Were you going to send her something via space mail? Maybe some of Hunk's cooking?" he asked, walking over to sit next to him.

The smile faded away from Lance's face. "Well, I can't, really. We're so far away from home, I don't know if I could find a way to ever reach them." He looked over at Keith, but avoided his eyes. "I don't know. I just like writing them, even if they don't get sent."

"Them?" Keith raised an eyebrow.

"Oh yeah, I have a bunch of envelopes and paper that I picked up from the space mall, I've been writing letters almost every evening since. I've got a big family, it takes awhile to get all that out on paper."

"Seriously? How many have you written?"

Lance hesitated for a moment. "I can show you, if you want."

Keith froze. "You don't have to do that if you're not comfortable with it."

"Nah, I trust you not to blab anything to the others. And I feel like I owe you something for being an ass." Lance stood up and offered Keith a hand. "So, you want to hear more about my crazy family?"

Keith smiled and grabbed his hand, standing up. "Yeah. Just let me shower and I'll be right over."

"Ok good. Don't want your greasy mullet all over my room." Keith shook his head with a huff and let go of Lance's hand to walk out to his shower.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Augh, I'm sorry this is so short. The next chapter will be longer and full of good ol' fashioned fluffiness. Hopefully.


	3. Letters to No One

A little while later, Keith shuffled up to Lance's room in his red lion slippers. His hair was still slightly damp and he had tied it up in a small ponytail. Reaching the door, he knocked three times before it slid open.

"Whoa!" Lance stood in front of him with wide eyes, his mouth agape.

"What?" Keith whirled around, looking for a Galra drone that had snuck in or something. "What's wrong?"

"I-I thought-" Lance choked out around his laughter. "I thought you cut your mullet!"

Keith's face lit up as red as his slippers and he hit back the laugh bubbling up in his throat. "You can't do that after all the stuff we've been through, man! I thought I was going to get shot in the back or something!"

"Ah, whoo, ok," Lance trailed off, recovering. Keith couldn't take his eyes off of the pink that was tinging his cheeks as the smile lingered on Lance's face. "It looks good dude! Not that I don't like the mullet, you just look nice. You know what I mean, come on." Keith hadn't even processed half of his rapid fire ramblings before he was pulled into Lance's room. "Make yourself at home." The doors closed behind them and Keith pulled off his jacket and slippers, sitting down on the bed. A moment later, Lance walked over with a stack of letters in his hand.

"You weren't kidding, huh?"

"Yeah, I have a lot of family and a lot of emotions to vent out." Lance handed the stack of paper to him and crawled over, flopping down on the bed. Keith held the first one in his hand for a second, looking at Lance. He just nodded, a slight smile across his mouth and Keith pulled out the first letter, Lance scooting over to read over his shoulder.

* * *

Hiya Soph!

First of all, I wanted to say that I’m sorry for leaving without saying goodbye. That wasn’t a very nice thing to do and I’m sure Mama is going to give me a whack on the head as soon as I get back. But guess what? I’m in space right now! Yeah, that’s right, your big bro is up above your head fighting a whole bunch of aliens. See, there’s this evil guy named Zarkon who’s done a lot of really bad things and hurt a lot of people. So Hunk and I and the rest of my friends are helping fight him using this big robot called Voltron! It’s made up of five lion robots that are driven by each of my friends. I have Blue, and I can’t wait to take you for a ride sometime! She’s even faster than Papa’s car! I can’t wait for you to meet the rest of my team, they’re all so cool. I know you’ll like Pidge, our engineer and professional smartypants. You two will get along so well! And you wouldn’t believe it, but we met this beautiful alien princess! Her name is Princess Allura from the planet named Altea. I’ve told her so much about you and she wants to meet you some day. If she teaches you anything, I can tell you right now, I’m going to be so scared of you some day. But in a good way!  
How are you? How’s school so far? You better make sure you ace all of your spelling tests or I might just have to fly down from space and tickle you! Oh, and how’s Chico? If I come home to find his fur all over my bed again, I swear, Sophia Carmensita McClain, you are in so much trouble!  
And it looks like I’m running out of paper. I wish I could bring you here right now so you could see all of this yourself, but once we bring peace to the universe, I promise you, you’re coming to the castle to meet my friends and all of the lions! I miss you so much and I’m sending you and Phillip a thousand hugs! Take care of everyone for me until I get back, ok? Be strong and believe in yourself, _estrellita_. I love you lots!

Your big bro,  
Lance

* * *

 

Keith looked up to see Lance gazing down at the paper, a wide smile plastered across his face. "She sounds like a cool kid."

"Oh you have no idea dude." Lance shook his head, staring off into the distance. "She's so smart for a seven year old. Last time I saw her she was six, but I'm assuming her birthday passed. It was two months after we..." His smile faltered for a second. Keith just looked at him, unsure of what to say to help him feel better. Lance rubbed at his eyes before continuing. "But yeah, she's a good kiddo. She used to draw me pictures all the time when she was really little. She couldn't say my full name because she couldn't pronounce Ls so she just called me Nance. It was close enough."

Keith snickered. "Well, I'm going to have to call you that now."

"Dude, please don't! Nothing would make me more uncomfortable than you calling me by my baby sister's pet name. Oh shit I shouldn't have said that, should I?" Lance groaned, slamming a hand to his forehead.

Mimicking an evil laugh, Keith shuffled through more of the letters. Most of them were quite similar to Sophia's, but the tenth one stood out to him.

* * *

 

Hey Tony,

I don’t know if this will ever actually reach you, but it feels good just knowing that somehow you might hear these words so here I go.  
I’m ok. I’m alive with Hunk and some other friends out in space. I somehow unlocked this ancient technology in the desert and I can pilot this giant lion robot that's basically an alien spaceship. Wow, I just realized how insane I sound. I know it might not make much sense, it's still crazy for me to think about it. We found the aliens who own these lions and they told us that the universe is being slowly conquered by an alien emperor named Zarkon who is capturing people and destroying innocent worlds. So my friends and I are working together to take these robots around the universe, forming together to create one big machine named Voltron. We're protecting the universe, man! It's so exciting and the only thing that I wish was different is that you could be along for the ride.  
I hope you’re doing alright. How’s the shop? And Elena? I’ll tell you right now, if there’s one day I will be back for, it’s your guys' damn wedding, however many more years in the future. Don’t let go of her man, no matter how many times you guys may piss each other off. I know how much you love her. And you gotta hold onto that when someone is that special to you.  
I know you’re mad at me. I know, I’m a jackass and an idiot and I don’t think before I do things. Every single day I regret not going back for just two minutes to give you a hug before I left. I miss you like you seriously wouldn’t believe, bro. But I will be back, I don't care how many more Galra ships I have to destroy.  
In the meantime, I hope your life is good, please give everyone at the shop a big hug for me! Good luck with everything and take care of Mama until I come home. I love you guys, I can't wait to see you again soon.

Lance

* * *

 

Rubbing at his eyes, Keith felt a pang in his stomach after he finished reading. He looked over at Lance to see him sniffling and wiping a few tears. "I," he started, taking a shaky breath. "I was only a few years apart from Tony. He was my best friend for so much of my life and _dios mio_ Keith. I wish you could meet him." Lance beamed at him through his tears, making Keith's heart skip a beat. "He's really funny, he's one of the most talented people I've ever known and he'll kick anyone's ass if they mess with our family. He helped my mom teach me Spanish." He chuckled. "I have him to thank for all the times I swore right under Iverson's nose." Keith smiled at his friend as more tears leaked from Lance's eyes. He pulled Lance into a hug and the boy hesitated before burying his head in Keith's shoulder and holding him tightly by the waist.

"It reminds me of how I felt when I lost Shiro on the Kerberos mission," Keith whispered. "I know how much that hurts, but I can't imagine multiplying that by 11." Lance just sniffled and gripped the back of his shirt. Keith felt a twinge of guilt for allowing himself to enjoy Lance's breath against his neck, feeling his arms around his body. He had to pull his head out of the clouds if he was going to be there for him. "I'm here for you man," Keith continued. "And so is everyone else if you don't feel comfortable talking to me. We either are or were all separated from family and we can relate or give you as many space cookies as you need to feel better." Lance giggled and pulled away, their foreheads almost touching.

"Of course I want to talk to you. I may not let on as much, but you mean a lot to me, man." The look on Keith's face made Lance's stomach flip. God, how could this boy be so gorgeous?

"Uh huh," Keith replied skeptically, leaning away and shuffling through the letters before he did anything stupid. "I'm sure you'd sell me out to the Galra for a chicken nugget."

"Oh don't you even go there Kogane!" Lance groaned, flopping over, now splayed out on the bed. "Jesus I miss Earth food so much." Keith scooted down to lie next to him, holding the last letter up towards the ceiling for both of them to read.

* * *

 

Mama,

I guess from me actually sending you a letter you've probably realized that I'm ok. I'm safe, I'm on a mission with Hunk, Pidge and a few other friends. We're basically all piloting a bunch of lion spaceships that form together into one big robot called Voltron. It's an ancient symbol of hope and we're doing our best to spread peace throughout the universe. In the last ten thousand years, it turns out that this alien emperor, Zarkon, has been conquering planets all over the universe. And when we found these lions, we met some good aliens called Alteans and they told us about the legend of Voltron. I think you'd like them, especially Princess Allura. She's very proper and kind, but she totally has _abuelita's_ attitude and she could easily whoop all of our butts. But she revealed to us that we have a duty to protect everyone now, we've all connected with these lions and we're going to take Zarkon down.  
And get this, we're led by Takashi Shirogane! As in Shiro from the Kerberos mission! How cool is that? He's such a nice guy and he's a super awesome leader. I'm pretty sure our whole team calls him our Space Dad now. Our other pilot is named Keith, and I'm sure you'll adopt him as soon as you meet him. He's kind of moody, but he's got a big heart and he really cares about the team, you can tell. But I'm getting a bit off track here.  
I'm so sorry if I made you worry. I know I should have said goodbye and I regret not doing that every day. I can't even say how much I miss you and Papa and everyone else. I wish that I could come back and see all of you so I won't only have to picture you all to cheer me up. But you are the reason that I have to do this. If Zarkon makes it to Earth somehow, there's no question that he would destroy everything. We've seen what his armies can do and it's driving us to do everything we can to protect every innocent life in this universe. Allura told us that we are the universe's only hope and after seeing what it's come to over the last few thousand years, everyone's going to need us.  
So I guess what I'm saying is, I may not be home for awhile. But I'm going to keep fighting every day with the thought that I'm going to see your smile again. I love you so much, Mama. Make sure everyone helps keeps the kitchen tidy, I can't stand those piles of dishes.  
  
Lance

* * *

 

Finished, Keith folded the letter up carefully, placing it back inside the envelope. He gathered all of the letters and set them neatly on the floor before turning back to Lance. His eyes tinged red from crying but he managed a little smile.

"Well? What did you think?" he asked, trying to keep his cool. That last letter was one of the hardest things he'd ever had to write, and the impact didn't change when re reading it. He was pulled into Keith's deep purple eyes as the boy gave him a small smile, less than a foot away from him.

"I think I wish I had your family."

The corners of Lance's eyes crinkled as his smile widened. "Be careful what you wish for. They'll take you in faster than Pidge can hack a droid."

"I doubt it. I'm the loner, remember?"  
Lance snorted. "Oh please. I can just hear my parents now. 'Tell us more about your time in the Garrison? And all of your missions, they must have been very interesting! I trust you kept my boy out of trouble?' And my little cousins all begging to go on a quick flight with a master pilot. And your hair..." He reached over to brush the bangs away from Keith's eyes. "It'll be full of braids and flowers before you know it."

Keith didn't know how to feel. He'd never had a proper family, and he normally kept everything to himself, no matter how lonely it was. But Lance, being so open and trusting of him made him feel like his body had been injected with warmth. They lay there for awhile, just taking in the silence before Keith tentatively broke it.

"Lance?"

"Mmhm?"

"Thank you."

The boy flashed him an inquisitive look. "What for? I should be thanking you for listening to me blabber on about my family for hours."

"Well, it was my pleasure. I just," Keith trailed off, scratching the back of his neck. "I appreciate you being so trusting of me. I feel like this is something really special to you."

"Yeah, it is. Don't sell yourself short, man, I think you're a trustworthy person to say the least. Unless you're giving me a haircut. Then all bets are off."

"Oh shut up," Keith snapped jokingly. "You do realize I can't cut your hair to make it longer, right dumbass?" He lightly kicked Lance in the shin.

"Say whatever you want, Mullet," he retorted, pushing his hair back with his hand. "You're not getting any of this magic."

"Uh huh. Black magic is more like it."

"I think we both know that's your specialty as the resident wannabe emo. I've heard the pathetic excuses for music that come from your room."

"Excuse me, Panic! At The Disco is a perfectly acceptable band. At least it's better than Shakira or Gwen Stefani."

"Oh that's the final straw right there, I'm disowning you as a friend." Keith chuckled and rolled over to look at the ceiling as silence fell upon them again. "Do you ever miss Earth?"

Keith turned his head to look at him, surprised. "Kind of. I mean, I didn't really have a whole lot there, especially after Shiro left. I do miss my house and a few parts of the Garrison, like that little reading lounge, but that's about it. The thing I miss the most is the sunsets. It was nice to watch them outside my window before I went to sleep, especially when I was younger. But yeah, that's about it. Why?"

Lance shook his head. "I can't believe how little of the world you got to see. Like you've never gone to a beach? Seen a snowstorm? Had a water gun fight?"

Keith shrugged as much as he could while lying down. "Not really. I lived in the desert for most of my life. That I can remember, at least. Other than that, just the blur of a small town when I was younger."

"Nuh uh no way," Lance told him, stifling a yawn. "I am going to absolutely destroy you in a snowball fight. A real one, not like those mushy asteroids."

"If we ever go back."

" _When_ we go back," Lance corrected and Keith looked up to see his expression steely and determined. "I made a promise in those letters. I will go back home if it is literally the last thing that I do."

"You are nothing if not stubborn," Keith yawned widely, his eyes started to close as Lance gently poked his forehead in retaliation.

-o0o-

The next morning, Lance kept his eyes closed as he woke up, feeling much warmer than usual. Something tickled his neck and he realized Keith was cuddled up next to him. One arm was around Lance's chest and the boy's head was tucked close to his neck, while his own arm had thrown itself across Keith's shoulder. His hair had fallen out of its ponytail and was messily splayed out around his head. Lance started panicking in his head before he realized from Keith's shallow breathing against his collarbone that he was still asleep. He started to relax again and just enjoyed how close Keith was, feeling slightly guilty in the process. He just hoped that he couldn't hear how fast his heart was beating.

-o0o-

Keith's eyes fluttered open and he found himself looking right at Lance's neck. His eyes widened for a moment as he took in his surroundings and how interlinked they were, unsure of what to do. Should he slip out or just stay and wait for Lance to do something? Keith so badly wanted to just cling to him tighter and forget about any other social ramifications, but every instinct was screaming at him to move away before his hazy brain did something rash. In the middle of thinking through all of the potential scenarios, he unconsciously shifted his weight and felt Lance stir. He looked up to meet his eyes, still heavy with sleep.

"Morning, Sleeping Beauty," Lance said softly, with just a hint of his usual attitude.

"Is it even morning?" Keith mumbled, ignoring his reddening face and taking the excuse to detangle himself and look out to the door. "The hallway lights are still off." He glanced at the clock on Lance's desk and answered his own question stiffly, "Yeah it's still early in the morning. I'll head on back to my room and stop bugging you." He stood and Lance grabbed his wrist.

"Whoa, whoa calm down." Keith stopped and looked down at him one more time. "Thank you again. It was nice to have someone to talk to about this, someone who understands these kind of things."

"Yeah, you're welcome. Anytime." Keith hesitated for a second. "Speaking of that, um, do you mind if I borrow those letters for a few days?"

Lance froze. "Why?"

"I just, I'd like to read them again. It reminds me of when I actually had my dad around, and I'd like to keep those memories as fresh as I can."

"Yeah, sure," Lance said, not entirely convinced. "Take as long as you need, just be really careful with them please."  
"Of course." Keith picked up the letters and shuffled on his slippers before walking to the door. "Good night, Lance."

"Yeah you too. Sleep well."

_Not likely,_ Keith thought as the door closed behind him.

Lance laid back down in his bed, hating himself for being such an idiot. He drifted off, his anger melting into a painful ache as the smell of Keith's hair still stayed with him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> No joke you guys, it was insanely difficult writing those letters, especially while listening to Life is Strange (look it up on YouTube while you read, Chrysalis and Max & Chloe are the best songs) goddamn that soundtrack is pretty.  
> Also ponytail Keith and cuddling are both my weaknesses.  
> Edit: I have to express my love for the fact that the paladin ACTUALLY HAVE LION SLIPPERS HOW CUTE IS THAT!  
> Ok thank you for your time, carry on.


	4. Some Nights

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Research  
> Sciency things  
> Not really  
> Some Klangst  
> Don't know what else to put here  
> Enjoy

As he padded down the hallway back to his room, Keith fingered the corners of the letters. Lance's words rang in his head from before he nodded off.

_I made a promise. I will go back home if it is literally the last thing that I do._

An idea was starting to form in his mind. It had sparked just before he had asked to borrow the letters and it had started to grow, now consuming Keith's thoughts. He started to hope that it might work, but he realized that he would need to look into some things. The lab was probably deserted at this time, but he was too tired to do anything for the moment. Shaken out of his thoughts, Keith heard footsteps coming down the hallway. He stuck close to the wall until he saw Pidge round the corner, glasses on top of their head and hands in their pockets.

"Quiznack, Pidge, you scared me," Keith breathed. "What are you doing? Why are you up so early?"

"Can't sleep," they grumbled, stretching their arms. "Might go do some reading or watch the stars for awhile." Arms folded, Pidge raised an eyebrow at him, glancing back down the hallway he came from. "What are you doing up, Mr. 20 questions?"

"I was, um, training?"

"Uh huh," Pidge replied, completely unfazed. "Is that what the kids are calling it nowadays?"

"What are you talking about?"

"Wow, you are impossible." They bumped his shoulder gently with their fist before shuffling away. "Get some sleep, team leader. You're gonna need it."

-o0o-

The next few weeks were packed with training exercises, meditation and recon missions on the nearby Galra outposts. Keith was exhausted, but despite their intense schedule, he was taking more time after all of his other duties to do as much research as he could. One such evening, he sat tapping away at the castle's computers, his back aching and legs sore. Finally able to locate the earth's coordinates, his stomach sank to see how far it was. It would take him literal years just to get there in one lion. Voltron could be faster, but even then it would still take a substantial amount of time that none of them had to spare. He rubbed at his face and tried to re-focus. Scanning the star map intensely, he noticed a small outpost just a light year from the earth. Keith started to get a little hopeful and zoomed in, reading through the articles that popped up. It was a small version of the space mall, offering food, spare parts and...a delivery service. Keith frantically clicked away, so immersed in his work that he didn't even notice Pidge until they plonked their chin down on top of his head. Even then, he barely flinched.

"Whatcha doin?"

"Nothing. Just poking at some Earth stuff," Keith replied, not exactly lying. "You?"

"Waiting for you to get out of my prime sitting place. You're hogging two monitors dude."

"Oh. Sorry." Pidge jumped on the other computer, transferring some files to a memory stick. Out of the corner of his eye, Keith could see them glance at him more than normal. "You ok there?"

"I don't think I'm the one who needs to be questioned about being fine, Keith."

"What's that supposed to mean?" he asked, a bite behind his words from lack of sleep.

"It means you're not yourself. And you're more of a brooding asshole than ever."  
Keith sighed, rubbing his eyes. "Sorry. Had a couple of late nights."

"What are you researching? I know there's nothing left on earth for you." Keith flinched and turned to look at Pidge, who regarded him with no small amount of suspicion.

"What makes you think it's any of your business?"

"It's not," they replied simply, grabbing their memory card and standing up. "I won't bug you about it. But I just know if we can't form Voltron in the not so distant future, I will blame you and Lance. You guys need to kiss and get over it." Keith's mouth dropped open as Pidge walked towards the door. "Seriously, Keith, you need to get some sleep so you can open your eyes a bit more. Both literally and figuratively."

The doors shut behind them and Keith went back to his work, now furious. At Pidge, at himself, at Lance. At his soft hair, his smile, his vast blue eyes, the way he always managed to smell like the ocean...  
Shaking his head as if it would physically vanish Lance from his mind, he tried to use his anger to fuel his research. Clicking around the outpost, he found that it was a chain operation. Grinning madly, he found one of the stations a much shorter distance away, just a two hour journey from the next planet they had received a distress call from. He tried to click around for more information, but his brain always went back to him. To his hands brushing Keith's bangs away and tangling in his hair, to the boy's arm around his waist, their breaths mingling in the short space between them. Keith leaned back with a sigh, rubbing the bridge of his nose. He still didn't fully accept that he had shared such an intimate moment from his friend's life, something that Lance himself even acknowledged as special. A little smile crept up Keith's lips as he recalled Lance's eyes when he was rambling about his family, so full of happiness and love. Keith allowed himself to get lost in his thoughts, vividly remembering waking up next to him. How close they were, how tempted he was to lean just an inch closer...  
The smile faded as Keith brought himself to reality. He shouldn't let himself have any sort of false hope. There was no way that Lance would ever be interested in him, judging by the amount of girls he threw himself at. And even if he was gay or bisexual or something of the like, even if Keith gave himself that small hope, he knew a relationship between them would never work. He had no doubts that Lance would hate him all over again or lose interest in him almost immediately, springing for another cute alien on a distant planet. Keith sighed, feeling the warmth drain out of him. Feeling a few tears trickle down his face, he let them flow. He put his head down on the desk, wishing with every ounce of his brain that he could erase all of these thoughts from his head. He so badly wanted to bring that idiot into his heart, to let him see the most vulnerable parts of himself. But at the same time it terrified him more than any torture the Galra could ever come up with. Keith let out a shaky sigh as his tears subsided. He was tired of being hurt, tired of being wracked with grief whenever someone important was taken from him. But he wondered if pushing everyone away was all that better. Hearing the doors slide open behind him, he quickly shut off the monitor and angrily brushed his tears away.

"Keith?"

 _GODDAMMIT_! Keith thought at the sound of that voice. "Yeah. What?" He groaned internally at how fragile his voice sounded.

"Shiro sent me to come and check up on you. You alright?" Lance asked as he strolled over.  
_Shiro_? Keith thought in disbelief. _Why_ _didn't_ _he_ _come_ _himself_ \- "That bastard," he muttered out loud. _Am_   _I really that obvious? Does everyone want to make my life hell at this point?_

"What?"

"Nothing. Everything's good, thanks." Keith stood up to leave, keeping his face down and away from Lance.

"Hey, man," Lance stopped him, grabbing his arm. "Are you sure you're ok?"

"Yes," Keith growled through gritted teeth. "Let go of me."

"It's ok if you don't want to talk about it, but I am here if you-"

"Who are you, Shiro?" Keith snarled, trying to wrench his arm away. "One brother is enough, thanks. Don't waste all your worrying on me, save that for your family that you'll never see."

Lance pulled him around sharply, forcing Keith to look at him. He rarely saw Lance angry nowadays and he really didn't miss it. "Look, I don't know what the hell's been up with you for the past couple days, but..." As the fight drained out of Keith, Lance noticed the tear tracks down his face. His eyes were collecting dark circles and his hair stuck up at odd angles. He even looked paler than usual.

"I'm sorry," Keith mumbled, not daring to look into Lance's face. He regretted his words more with each passing second. "I'm so sorry." He let his arms hang by his sides as Lance pulled him into a hug. A few more tears leaked out of his eyes as he refused to let himself enjoy the arms around him. Lance tensed up a bit as he realized how still Keith was. He winced internally, vividly remembering how quickly Keith had wanted to leave his room the other night.

"It's ok," Lance said over his shoulder. "Just know that we're worried about you, alright?"

Keith nodded silently as Lance let go of him with a small smile and squeezed his shoulder before walking back out the door. Even when he was all the way down the hall, he wouldn't stop berating himself.  
_You had to go with the "sleeping beauty" line, didn't you?_  
"Oh shut up," Lance muttered to himself as he shoved his hands further down his pockets, making his way to the kitchen.

 

After watching him go, Keith took a moment to collect himself, covering his face with his hands. He told himself over and over that the reason he was delivering these letters was not to gain Lance's affections in any way. It wasn't.

_Then what is it for, huh?_

Keith gritted his teeth against the voice in his head, turning the monitor back on to transfer the coordinates.

_Because he damn well deserves some happiness, whether or not it's from me._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'd like to think that Keith hasn't told Shiro anything about Lance, but his Space Dad 6th sense knows all. And yay more Pidge, I love them to bits! Hope September treated y'all well!


	5. Takeoff

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lack of communication + Caring too much = Klance Angst

After three more late nights of research, Keith finally thought he could find this outpost. The only time he had left his room was to have a quick bite to eat and to complete their newest mission of liberating the next planet from Galra control. After working around the clock, his body was exhausted, but he felt infused with nervous energy. Everyone else was at a small festival that the inhabitants had thrown for their efforts and Keith knew he had to act within the night before the castle was going to depart again. He sat in his room, bracing himself for what he was about to do, shuffling through the letters in his hand. With shaking fingers, Keith pulled out the letter that he himself had typed to proofread one last time.

 

   Mr. and Mrs. McClain,

I hope you and the rest of your family are doing well. My name is Keith Kogane and I have been working with your son for the last few months. He has been writing these letters with little hope that they will reach you, and so I am going to do my best to deliver them. I hope they find you as soon as possible.  
As Lance will explain, him, myself and a few others have become paladins of Voltron. We are basically pilots, trying to restore peace to planets that have been forcefully conquered by an alien race known as the Galra. I know it must sound ridiculous, but it is entirely true.  
I will leave the rest for Lance to explain, but first I wanted to let you know how incredibly proud you should be of him. I have never met anyone like your son. He is the one who holds the entire team together, whether with his jokes or his incredible compassion or his selflessness. Lance was the first of all of us to unlock his ship's powers and he has grown into a fantastic pilot with incredible aim. He has gradually become one of my best friends after I was isolated from a family for many years. He is an important part of our group and we would all fall apart with him.  
With all of that being said, I must ask of you something very important and that is to keep all of the information in all of these letter a secret as best you can. As we free these people, many of us, especially Lance, are scared of the fact that Earth could be next. We trying our best to keep these forces at bay, and the less that people know on Earth the better.  
With that, I'll leave the rest to Lance. I hope you will be able to see him in the near future.

Regards,  
Keith

 

Keith smiled down at his work, pulling out the other pieces of paper in the envelope. He had managed to weasel some photographs out of Pidge at the sacrifice of his dessert privileges. He looked down at the pictures, some of Lance fooling around with some alien citizens, a couple of the Alteans and inside the castle. And finally a group shot of all of them in front of the lions. Keith couldn't help but let his eyes linger over Lance, his arms around both Hunk and Keith's shoulders, his giant smile on display. He sighed, tucking them carefully back inside their envelope before glancing at the other papers next to him. Keith had put together similar letters and pictures for Hunk's parents and Mrs. Holt the night before. They deserved to know about their children's accomplishments just as much as Lance's family. He had also written Shiro a note, just in case anyone started to worry.

 

Shiro,

I'm going to be gone for the night, just so you know. I'm taking the black lion on a short trip. I just have to take care of something personal and I'll be back soon. Please don't panic or anything. If I'm not back by morning then feel free to come after me, but please let me try to do this on my own first. See you soon.

Keith

 

Taking one last look at the note, Keith took a deep breath and walked out of his room. He stuck the message to Shiro's bedroom door where he was taking a break from the festivities thrown by the planet's citizens. As much as Shiro wanted to pretend he was fine again, Keith knew something was still amiss from when he was gone and was never surprised when the guy turned in early. With that done, he hurried down the halls, making his way to the lions' chambers. The passages were dimly lit and eerily quiet and Keith could only hope that no one had noticed him slipping away. Once he had made it to the hangar, he tucked all of the letters carefully into one of the pouches on his belt. He had debated putting on his flight suit, but decided it would be best to just use his normal clothes to be as discreet as possible. They had enough problems without word of a Voltron paladin strolling into a space mall with a traceable connection back to Earth. Keith absent-mindedly fingered his bayard, his thumb running along the hilt. This would be his first time flying with only his helmet and his bayard as protection and he was fully aware of how risky it was going to be. He took a deep breath, facing the black lion.  
_Enough wasting time, let's go._

"Keith?" He froze, his blood running cold all of a sudden. Lance stood in the doorway, looking just as surprised as Keith. He glanced at the helmet under Keith's arm and bayard in his hand before cracking a smile. "Not going to go find Lotor all by yourself, are you?" When Keith's expression didn't change, Lance started to actually get worried. "Are you?" he repeated cautiously.

"No, no, don't worry. I'm just heading out for a bit," Keith managed, wanting nothing more to sprint to the black lion and fly away.

"Where?" There was a pause as they just stared at each other.

"I can't tell you that. I have to-"

"Listen man, I’m not going to just leave you to a mission by yourself," Lance cut him off, crossing his arms. "We're a team, remember? I'll come with you."

"No, Lance, it won't work like that! It's not a big deal, I'll be back by morning, ok?" Keith hissed, still cautious of the others coming back.

"No way, there’s gotta be more to it. You've been acting weird for a while, like more than usual. You're somehow even more closed off, you're exhausted and you've been avoiding me like the plague." Lance sighed, hanging his head. He couldn't help but still feel guilty about pushing himself onto Keith the other night. The guy had barely spoken to him since then, and every time he had, it had been as short as possible. "You know, if you have a problem with me, you can always talk to me about it. If something that I do makes you uncomfortable...you just gotta tell me. And I'll stop."

Keith’s face was burning more and more with every word Lance was saying. He was kind of thankful for him being a total oblivious idiot so he could avoid his own feelings for the time being. "No, Lance that’s not it," he said, walking back to the doorway where Lance was still standing.

"Then why won't you tell me where you're off to in the middle of the night, without a word to anyone!"

Keith clenched his fists as he struggled to find an excuse. "It's a...it's a personal thing. You just have to let me do this!"

"Why?" Lance asked angrily. "This always happens! You go to do these stupid, dangerous things on your own without a second thought! You don't seem to care that you might actually die one of these days, but have you ever thought about what that would do to us? That we would be devastated if you never came back?” Lance stopped, his chest heaving at his outburst. He felt bad about flipping out on Keith like that, but he held his ground, looking him right in the face.

Taken aback by Lance's outburst, Keith froze for a moment. His heart was beating so much that he could feel it in his ears and his brain was spilt between grabbing Lance and kissing him until he couldn't breathe or running away before his legs gave out. Keith just stepped forwards placing a hand on Lance's chest. "You're just going to have to trust me. I'll be back in the morning." With those words he pushed Lance back slightly and shut the door, quickly locking it.

Stunned for a moment, Lance immediately started pounding on the door. "Keith! What the hell man, open this door right now. Keith, don't make me come in there! Don't you dare leave the hangar, I swear to god. Keith? Keith!"  
Keith was already running to the black lion, trying to ignore Lance's yells. By the morning this would all be sorted out. Hopefully.

-o0o-

By the time Lance had gotten the doors open and into his lion, Keith had already used Black to teleport away. Circling the castle, Lance scanned for any trace of a trail he could follow, but came back with nothing. He quickly punched in Keith's hail to contact him.

"Keith?" Lance's face flickered up on the dashboard.

"Holy- Lance, what do you want?" Keith asked after jumping a foot in the air.

"I want you to turn your lion around and come back so we can talk about this."

"No."

"Look, I get it if you don't want me around," Lance told him, his voice wavering slightly. "But you should at least take Shiro or Hunk or someone else with you."

"Did you see Shiro with me in the hangar? Did you see me talking to Hunk about this? I'm doing this myself. It's not that bad, just stop worrying!"

"I swear to quiznak, Keith, you are so goddamn stubborn! If you don't get back here, I am going to fly the castle after you myself."

"You can't. You don't have Altean blood, and even if you did, you've never even tried to fly the castle before."

There was a pause. "Ok, you got me there. But please, turn around-"

"I'm not going to!" Keith shouted, gripping the controls even tighter. "Just let me do this for you!" For a moment, all they could hear was the soft clicks and beeps of the lion's controls.

"What?"

"I'll...I'll explain everything when I get back, ok?" Keith sighed. "Please just trust me on this one." Lance was silent for at least twenty full seconds and during every bit, Keith fought harder and harder to keep his tears back.

"Ok." Keith looked up to see Lance's resigned but determined expression.

"Fine. But if you die out there, I'm going to kill you."

Keith couldn't help but chuckle. "I won't blame you."

"And Keith?"

"Please be careful."

Keith swallowed back his tears and nodded. "Yeah. I will." And with one last smile, Lance's face disappeared from the screen. Keith couldn't help letting some of the tears drop down at his cheeks, feeling sick to his stomach from guilt and anxiety. He pushed his thoughts away, focussing on staring at the stars rushing past him as he sped towards his destination.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hoo boy! It's all kicking off, I'm almost down to the final chapter in terms of writing. Also if anyone has some wholesome Klance fluffiness to refer to me, I could use it, midterms are coming up. Thanks my dudes, love you!


	6. Mission Log

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If you're good at something, never do it for free

Blinking sleep from his eyes, Keith checked the tracking systems for the fourteenth time. Three and a half hours of space travel and he was almost to the outpost. He had only fallen asleep once for about an hour, and he still felt terrible. His agenda kept running through his head.  
_Just get in, hand over the letters, get out._  
_Get in, letters, get out._  
_Get in, letters, get out_.  
Sighing, Keith let his head drop to his chest. He had little to no idea how this was going to work. Worst case scenario, he wouldn't be able to do it and would have to explain to the others why he made such a huge deal out of nothing. The control panel started beeping and Keith looked up to see a small planet ahead of him, with outcroppings of large buildings scattered on its surface. He almost cheered out loud. He had made it.

-o0o-

After parking the lion in a small forest near the mall, Keith walked about ten minutes to get to the nearest buildings. Stepping inside, he immediately got flashbacks to their first space mall adventure. This one was albeit a bit smaller, but creatures of all sorts roamed from shop to shop. Keith approached one of the first stands, where a large snake-like alien was being helped by an employee that seemed to be of the same species. As they chattered on in another language, Keith tried to read some of the signs around the kiosk, but every single one was in a language he didn't know.

"Can I help you?" Keith looked back and was surprised to see a regular girl about his age standing at the kiosk. Her dark hair flowed down her shoulders to her waist and her emerald eyes glimmered against her skin, the colour of black coffee. She wore a yellow off-shoulder shirt with black jeans and her black painted nails clacked on the counter as she waited for him to respond.

"Um, I was looking for a place to deliver something,” he told her blankly, feeling uncomfortable all of a sudden.

"Well, then you came to the right place." She pointed a finger up at the foreign sign above her head. "'Information and General Services.' S’what we do."

"Ok. Can you deliver these letters for me?" Keith asked, placing his pile of paper in front of her. The girl bit her lip, scanning the top envelope.

"Earth, huh? Ol’ Milky Way’s a long trip."

"It’s what you do, isn’t it?" Keith asked, feeling more irritated than usual from lack of sleep. "Don’t you have another location down that way too?"

She flashed him a grin. "I see you’ve done your research there, kiddo. Unfortunately, delivery runs are not as easy as you might think."

"So can you do this or not?"

"Well, that depends," the girl sighed, leaning towards him on one elbow. "Ya got anything for me?"

"Money?" Keith’s heart sank. He had absolutely no form of currency on him.

She shook her head. "Nah, money means nothing to me, especially not your earth chunks of metal. In my business, we barter." She winked at him, and by that, two eyelids closed and reopened from the corners like a reptile. A chill went up Keith’s spine and he took a step back, one hand on his bayard. The girl scoffed at him. "Relax, bucko, I’m not gonna tear your throat out. Not unless you piss me off." She chuckled to herself. "You humans have some great phrases, I miss using them."

Keith slowly removed his hand from his weapon, but he still kept his guard up. "What are you?"

"I'm an A-Morph." She huffed at Keith's confused expression. "Abnormal Morphic Fluidity. Basic appearance and tongue changes, it all comes pretty naturally. Third generation," she said proudly. "Comes in handy with the family business." Before Keith's eyes, she changed into a dozen different species within a few moments. She finally changed back to a different girl, this time with short blonde hair and a New Zealand accent. "Now then. Package delivery, all the way to earth. What have you got to offer me in return?"

Keith considered it. He had no idea what to do or what he could offer. Maybe he should have brought someone with him after all, Coran could wheel and deal like nobody's business. "Well," he sighed. "All I have is my ship, and I'm not giving that up."

With those words, the girl perked up. "A ship?"

"I just said, it's not on the table!"

"I don't want it, I'm the worst at flying. What I need is a pilot."

Keith crossed his arms, raising an eyebrow. Now this was something he knew about. "I'm listening."

"There are these nasty Galra types that mugged me on a run a while back. They took something from me and I haven't been able to get it back since. I know where they're hiding out, I just need a ride in." She pursed her lips, sizing Keith up. "Dunno if it's obvious but I'm not much of a pilot, anything techie is kind of not on my level."

"Where is this place?" he asked, skeptical.

"Maybe a full day by shuttle. How fast is your ride?"

Keith smirked. "Oh, she's fast, but if we're going, we're going now. I've got a tight schedule."

The girl shot him a wicked looking smile. "I like the way you roll. What's your name?"

"Keith. Yours?"

"You can call me Taran. Let's go for a ride, shall we?"

-o0o-

After they had made it back to Black, Keith was relieved to see that this Galra encampment was only an hour away. His thoughts were still racing, determined that he could do this.

_Get in, get out.  
Get in, get out._

"This ship is something else," Taran commented, letting her bag drop to the floor and poking at the metal inside the lion's head.

"Yeah, hold onto something," Keith replied flatly before flooring the accelerator. Taran shrieked as they took off, cursing at him in a multitude of different languages. They finally levelled out after a minute, zipping through space with Keith staring stoically ahead in his seat.

"So who are these letters for?" Taran asked, too loudly with Keith right next to her. "You miss your girlfriend or something?"

Keith bristled at the words, wanting to just ignore her comments and keep his head forwards. But he was too tired and stressed to keep his mental shields at maximum power. "Something like that," he sighed, his grip on the controls relaxing.

"How does she put up with you?" she scoffed. Keith could see her rolling her eyes through the back of his head and couldn't help but let out a quiet laugh.

"I don't know really. We're both equally infuriating, to be honest."

"I can only imagine." She walked up and plopped herself down on the floor beside him. Her hair was now thick, black and incredibly long, surrounding her body like a fuzzy blanket. "So...what is it you do, exactly?"

"I'm a paladin of Voltron. Basically, that means-"

"You're a what?" Taran's face popped up next to him with such speed that he almost attacked her out of panic. "I knew your ship looked familiar! So you're the black paladin! You're the head of Voltron, right? Does that make you the leader? Are-"

"Alright, calm down!" Keith barked. Taran was not put out at all by his shout, she just grinned madly at him. "I mean, I guess I am the leader? We did have another black paladin, but well...things...things are complicated. I don't really want to talk about it."

"Oh. Sorry." Taran bit her lip, eyeing his expression. "Still. It's pretty cool." Silence filled the compartment as stars and planets flew past the windscreen.

"So what's this thing we're after?" Keith asked, looking for any excuse to distract himself at this point.

"You aren't after anything. You're going to drop me off, I'm going to grab what I need, hopefully shoot some sons of bitches and we'll be out and on our way."

"If that's what you want. I might be useful though. I'm part Galra, I can operate their technology really well."

There was a pause as Taran just stared at him. "Nah," she said finally. "These idiots aren't that advanced, I doubt they use anything beyond padlocks."

"What's wrong?" Keith asked, bracing for some foul comments.

"Nothing," she chuckled. "It's just that I realized I have no right to judge you on any level for being part Galra. My uncle is a Gaelean, good lord.

"What's a Gaelean?"

Taran mimed vomiting. "You really don't want to know."

"I'll take your word for it, I guess," he replied, shaking his head with a smile. They sat in silence for a few more minutes before the control panel broke it with a loud beeping.

"We close already?" Taran asked, leaning over the flickering lights.

"Yeah. There it is." A small planet loomed up before them, lush and green save for a patch of purple stone and dull metal structures.

"And there's the base," she replied, pointing to the chunk of buildings. Keith looked up to see that she had changed into an old space suit that she had pulled from her bag. "When we get close enough, I'll fly out. Then just find a nice quiet spot to park and be ready to come pick me up."

"How will I know when you're finished?"

Taran winked at him. "Oh you'll know." Without another word, she ran off to the interior hangar. Once Keith had flown close enough, the lion spat her out and she flew into some foliage right next to the outpost. With that done, Keith landed Black in a small clearing within seeing distance of the tower and tried to relax.

-o0o-

After not even ten minutes, Keith's eyes shot open as he felt the explosion before he heard it. Looking up, he saw a thick plume of black smoke snaking up from the Galra encampment. Thinking that it was either a good sign or a very bad one, he immediately took off. As he circled the buildings, Keith's eyes narrowed as he saw a sizeable hole blown in the side of one of the tallest structures. Amidst the smoke and sparks, a purple figure was holding a large Galra blaster. Keith was about to veer away before the person jumped out, spiralling down a few meters before sprouting a pair of huge white wings. He immediately steered back and and the lion's jaws opened to catch Taran as she glided in.

"Go!" he could hear her yell through the wall, and he wasted no time flying away. As the planet was left behind to become a tiny speck, Taran joined him in the cockpit. "Whoo!" she sighed, stretching her arms. Keith looked up to see her still in full Galra disguise, her ears sticking out from fluffy, long purple hair. "That was fun." Despite her words, some of the usual confidence was gone from her voice and Keith could feel her lean slightly on his chair for support.

"Did you get it?"

"Yup."

"Good." They flew in silence for awhile, the only sound being Taran's heavy breathing.

"So..." Keith looked up at her as she trailed off, her yellow eyes focused on him. "It seems like you're risking an awful lot to just deliver some letters. This girl really worth all of that?"

He smiled as Black's mechanisms hummed around them. "You have no idea. But it is more than that. I also have some letters to the families of my teammates. They haven't seen their parents in...months, years, I can't even tell anymore. But their families deserve to know what great people they are. I don't care how far I have to go to do that, they need some hope if they're going to save the world."

There was a beat. "I haven't seen my sister in a decaphoeb." Taran kneeled next to him. "I know how much that hurts. You got a family?"

Keith shook his head. "My team is the closest thing I have to that."

"I can tell." There was a clink as Taran held something up out of the corner of his eye. When Keith glanced over, he saw a teal stone, fashioned into a pendant half the size of his palm. The ridges were lined with a deep purple metal and the stone itself was engraved with strange markings he had never seen before. "This is what I went to get. When I got caught, those bastards took everything I had on me. Some money, my blaster, even my coat. But I drew the line at this." She pulled the cord over her head and as soon as she let it fall around her neck, she started to change. She shrank to about a head shorter than Keith himself, her skin turning a sickly pale green. Dark blue hair framed her face to her shoulders and a row of yellow dots half the size of dimes lined the bottom of her eyes. Her ears stuck out in long points and her limbs became spindly thin, only covered by a small off-white garment resembling an old pillowcase. When she did open her eyes, they were a brilliantly dark purple, so dark they were nearly black. She started to speak, showing needle thin teeth, but she was speaking in a language so garbled that Keith couldn't even distinguish between words. She pulled off the pendant, speaking in English although her appearance stayed the same. "This stone keeps me to my real form. I used to wear it all the time, especially when I couldn't control my appearance all that well. I basically depended on it, I would have been completely terrified if I had lost it. I liked it because it would keep me the same when my emotions went haywire. But my family hated it. My sister eventually took it away from me, and once I was able to be comfortable with what I was, she gave it back. As a reminder." She gave him a small smile. "This is who I really am." Holding up the pendant she told him, "I'm stronger than this."

Keith hesitated before drawing the Blade of Marmora knife from his belt. "Seems like we're not so different."

Taran looked down at the knife and patted him on the shoulder. "I guess not. Now let's get back so I can hold up my end of the deal."

One wormhole jump later, the two of them had arrived back at the space mall. As soon as they touched down, Taran gave him an incredulous look.

"Are you kidding me? You could have done that the whole time?"

"It takes a lot out of me, alright?" Keith shot back weakly. "I'm still getting used to it."

Taran huffed and slung her bag over her shoulder. Barely managing to haul himself out of his chair, Keith walked outside with her and carefully handed her the stack of letters. "Seriously, kid, thanks for the help. These are getting to Earth even if I have to make every single other customer wait. I owe you."

Keith sighed. "Stop treating me like I'm a child! What are you, 19?"

Taran just stared at him. "I'm 173 Earth years old."

"Oh."

"Yeah, bucko, 'oh.' You take care now, do swing by if you have any more love letters." She turned away, about to walk out. "Good luck with your girlfriend!"

"Lance." Taran stopped and turned back around at his voice. "His name is Lance."

She ruffled his hair with a grin. "Good luck. See you around, Keith."

"Goodbye," he replied, feeling a little less stressed. She walked away with one last wink and Keith ran up to the cockpit with the tiniest bit of renewed energy. He had a family to see.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yayyy mission accomplished! As of now, the final chapter is almost finished, and I've got one more before that. Hope you are all enjoying the read!  
> Also SEASON 4 OH MY GOD I have been avoiding spoilers like crazy, I have no time because school is beating me over the head with work, the only writing I get done is on transit, but I cannot wait to watch it!


	7. Homewards

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keith pushes himself a bit too hard (shocking) and if he doesn't die from his own mistakes, the team may very well do it for him.
> 
> (I am SO sorry for the hiatus, I had everything written but I suck at uploads.)

The black lion's controls jolted Keith out of his sleep. He had no idea how long he'd been out, but now alarms were blaring and the back legs had taken a serious hit. There were a few Galra pilots zipping around them like flies, probably seven at most. Keith immediately jumped into evasive maneuvers, firing his laser as he tried to take in his surroundings as quickly as possible. There didn't seem to be any other forces, hopefully these soldiers happened upon him on patrol.

Checking his map, Keith groaned out loud. He was still an hour away. He was getting so close, all he needed was to lose these fighter pilots. He took two of them down with some well placed slices from the jaw blade, but the others circled him like vultures, taking careful shots. Black rumbled and lurched forwards, almost launching Keith's face into the dashboard. Shaking it off, he blasted forwards, trying to loop around and lose them in some space junk, but they were very agile for Galra ships. Keith closed his eyes and tried to breathe, concentrating all of his mind on teleporting to the castle. The black lion groaned at him, steadily flying through space. Keith growled in frustration, head pounding as he squeezed the controls tighter. But nothing happened. Opening his eyes, he caught a glimpse of a small asteroid field and rocketed towards it, hoping to lose his attackers. However, he was much more used to flying with Red and took almost more hits from crashes than the pilots.

Veering out to open space, Keith looked down at the dashboard, at the small dot that stood for the castle. He started to sink into his chair. This is how it was going to end. Taken down by a handful of Galra fighter ships in the middle of nowhere, too much of a proud idiot to say anything about where he was going. The irrational part of Keith's brain started freaking out. He was never going to see Shiro again, or Lance, or Pidge or any of the family he'd so briefly had. He was going to die filled with his own unanswered questions, while basically handing the Galra one of the most powerful weapons in the universe. It was completely hopeless.

"No," Keith whispered. "No," he repeated louder. "I did not come all this way to lose some stupid shootout alone!" He kicked the thrusters into the highest setting he could, shooting in the castle's direction. The sensors were still beeping like crazy, the pilots still hot on his tail. Bits of space debris ricocheted off of the windscreen. "I'm going home! Now!" Keith yelled, his body aching and his brain a jumbled mess. He could feel Black's presence growing stronger in his head as they started speeding up even more. Keith closed his eyes, his teeth gritted from the pulses of pain pressing into his brain. Everything flashed white for a second and Keith lurched forwards, almost falling against the controls. Looking up through the windscreen, he recognized the white and grey walls of the hangar. He shot out of his seat, tossing off his helmet. Ignoring the wooziness from the teleport, he hurried down to the stairs. If he could just make it back to his room, he would only have to explain himself to Lance and maybe Shiro, no one else would have to know. Halfway down the stairs leading out of his lion, his legs gave out as the adrenaline fled from his body. Black spots overtook the corners of his vision and he stumbled, about to collapse. Two pairs of strong hands took his arms on either side before he hit the floor.

"Where have you been?" he faintly heard Shiro say over his right shoulder.

"Mail run," he mumbled weakly before the room disappeared into darkness.

-o0o-

Lance dropped his head onto his knees, fed up with everything. Sure Keith was going to be fine, but he was in his healing pod for almost a full day since he had come back. That was too much time for Lance's own good to be sitting around and worrying, on top of the sleepless night he'd had when Keith had left in the first place. And here he sat now, leaning against the healing pod and clutching Keith's jacket like a blanket. He was just nodding off against the cool metal surface when he felt a hand shake his shoulder gently.

"Hey Lance," Hunk said, kneeling in front of him. "You doing ok?"

"Yeah, yeah I'm fine." He pushed himself up, sitting cross-legged as he rubbed the sleepiness from his eyes.

"Ok, because Allura was just telling me that Keith should be finished up in the healing pod any minute now. Everyone's on their way."

"Alright then,” Lance groaned, stretching his long arms and letting out a yawn.

"It seems like he was just suffering from severe exhaustion. That on top of whatever he was doing out there exerted him way too much. No broken bones or anything though, all mental stuff," Hunk sighed, standing up with his hands in his pockets.

Lance pulled himself to his feet, looking back into the pod where Keith was looking much better than the previous morning. "I'm not surprised. Did you see him yesterday? His eye bags were so bad it looked like someone had punched his lights out." Lance sighed, looking down at the floor. Hunk could see his friend’s lack of energy, and looked at him with concern. Lance glanced at him. “What?”

“Sorry dude, I’m just a little worried about you. You didn’t stay up all night did you?”

Lance sighed, rubbing at his eyebrows. “Almost. I went to get Shiro after he’d left and both of us waited for him in the hangar until he got back. Even if I had tried to go to sleep, I don’t know that I could’ve.

“You were really worried about him, weren’t you?” Hunk asked, grinning at him.  
“Shut up!” Lance squeaked, giving his friend a shove. “Not that much!”

“Dude, the last time anyone was this worried, it was me when we were going to go save the Balmerans. And I have to get back at you teasing me about Shay somehow.”

Lance chuckled, but his smile faded as his eyes drifted back up to Keith. “He's lucky he got back when he did."

"Yeah." Hunk gave him a one-armed hug as Pidge and Shiro walked in behind them.

"How's Keith looking?" Pidge asked, shuffling up to them and adjusting their glasses.

"He'll be back to normal in a few minutes," Hunk told them. "Shiro, did he say anything to you at all? Nothing about where he was going?"

The former black paladin shook his head, his arms crossed over his chest. "Not at all, I know as much as you guys. He only left a note on my door saying that he had to take care of something personal, and that he'd be back in the morning. Lance talked to him before he left."

"Yeah," Lance replied, turning to face Shiro. "But he didn't tell me any more than you. Stubborn as always," he muttered. "I went out to see if I could catch him with Red as soon as he took off, but he was already gone once I had gotten outside.”

"He was looking over a bunch of Earth stuff when I ran into him in the lab," Pidge piped up. "But he couldn't have gone there and back all in one night, even with the black lion's teleporting. It's just not fast enough."

"Hello everyone." Allura walked into the room, her forehead creased with worry and Coran following close behind her. "I see Keith hasn't woken up yet." They all shook their heads as the princess stepped up to the pod and tapped at the screen for a moment. "Ok, just a tick and he's..." She paused before smiling widely at her work. "He's fully healed now." With one more tap on the screen, it dissolved and Keith fell forwards. Hunk and Allura each caught one of his arms as he struggled to support his weight.

"How are you feeling?" Shiro asked, putting a hand on his shoulder.

"Better," Keith admitted, his voice hoarse from underuse. "How long was I out for?"

"About a day," Lance replied, giving his jacket back to him.

Keith almost dropped it. "Seriously?"

"You were in bad shape when you came back," Pidge said, crossing their arms. "But you seem fine now. Can you walk ok? Anything hurt at all?"

"Yeah, I'm good. Thanks guys."

"Good." There was a beat of silence before a pair of hands grabbed Keith's shoulders and he found himself looking at a very pissed off Lance.

"What in the hell were you thinking, man?"

"I-"

"That was extremely dangerous, why didn't you tell us where you were going?" Shiro asked, looking just as angry.

"Do you have any idea how worried we all were?" Allura demanded.

"I'm sorry, I didn't-"

"Sorry doesn't cut it at this point, dude," Pidge snapped, and Keith was taken aback to hear their voice wavering, eyes stubbornly fixated on the floor. "Where did you disappear to? Just be straight up."

"Ok ok," Keith shouted, pushing Lance's hands off of him. "I was..." He hesitated as his friends all glared at him. "I went to a space mall-" Everyone groaned and Pidge smacked their forehead with their hand. "Let me finish!" Keith took a deep breath and spoke quickly, ripping the bandaid off. "I went to the space mall because they had a mail service, and I sent letters to Earth, to Lance's family, Hunk's parents and Pidge's mom because I feel like I don't do enough for you guys to make it seem like I actually care about being a part of this team." He stopped, bracing for even more questions, but somehow the silence was even more deafening. They all stared at him with wide eyes, and Keith was determined to not look directly at Lance.

"You-" Hunk stuttered. "You sent letters to our families?"

"Yeah?" Keith's face started heating up as no one moved an inch. "Stop looking at me like that," he mumbled. Lance stepped towards him, tears beading in the corners of his eyes. He hesitated for a second before wrapping his arms around Keith's shoulders in a tight hug. Keith froze, unsure of what to do as he felt Lance sniffle over his shoulder, his hands gripping the back of his jacket. He then felt Pidge's head bury in his chest, Hunk's arms around all of them and soon enough, the entire team had enveloped him in a giant group hug. Keith looked down at his friends, all of the anxiety flowing out of him and replaced with an overwhelming relief. Allura stepped over and embraced them all, lifting the group off of their feet as she did so. Keith let out a loud laugh, feeling happier than he had in ages.

-o0o-

After many more questions, several friendly punches to the shoulder and a lot of space food, Keith sat in his room, finally able to breathe a sigh of relief. He hung up his jacket and let himself fall backwards onto his bed. This whole ordeal was finally over. Just as he allowed himself to think that things could get back to normal, there was a knock on his door.

"Yeah?" He sat up to see Lance walk in and suddenly, his heart jumped back into his throat. "Um...hey. What's-" Lance didn't say a word as he walked over, kneeling on his bed and embracing him again. Keith hesitantly wrapped his arms around him, letting his head drop.

"Thank you, Keith," Lance said over his shoulder. "Thank you so much."

"No problem," he muttered.

Lance let out a loud laugh and pulled away. "You didn't have to do that, you know. Go through all of that trouble."

"I wanted to," Keith admitted, looking down at his folded hands. "They should know that you're thinking about them. And you deserve to talk to your family while you're saving the universe."

"Aw, Keith. What would I do without you?" Keith just stared down at his hands, letting a tiny smile escape. "And hey," Lance continued, nudging him slightly. "It was very sweet of you to do that, and I appreciate it so much, but why didn't you take me with you?" Keith bit his lip, the smile vanishing. "And I get the whole 'surprise' thing, but seriously, all that trouble just for some dumb letters-"

"Because you wouldn't have let me go," Keith muttered.

Lance stopped short. "What?"

"You don't think that your happiness is worth anything, Lance. You...ugh, I'm bad with this stuff," he sighed, running a hand through his hair. "Look, if I had told you what I was doing, I know you would have stopped me. You don't seem to think that it matters whether you're happy or not, but you know what? It matters to me. It matters to all of us. You're really important to us, Lance. Someone like you deserves people that make you feel good about yourself."

Lance gazed at him through his tears. "Like you?"

Keith felt the blush creeping up his neck, but pointedly ignored it. "Like your family."

"You're a part of that too, you know," Lance told him, ruffling his hair with a grin. "My space family."

Keith smiled. "Yeah. I know." A deafening silence hung over them as they just looked at each other. Keith reached over to brush some of Lance's tears away and noticed the dark circles that had started to appear under his eyes. "You should get some rest." He pulled Lance to his feet and led him by the hand to the doorway. When he opened the door, Lance stopped before walking out and turned back to him.

"Keith. Seriously, though. Thank you."  
"I know, you've said that about twenty times already.

Lance smirked. "Yeah, and it's still not enough," he replied with a wink, letting go of Keith’s hand and walking back down the hallway. "See you later, Mullet."

Keith shut the door and stood still for a moment before immediately running to his bed and burying his face in his pillow. He let out a stream of muffled curse words before flipping back over and staring at the ceiling. Resisting temptation was hard work.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Next chapter will come out tomorrow. If it doesn't, everyone please scream at me.  
> (Also thank you guys so much for all the love in the comments, you give me life)
> 
> *I'd like to think Allura's super strength could lift everyone up in a group hug. Space mom is best mom


	8. Returning the Favour

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Lance writes Keith a letter of his own.

A few days later, Keith sank into his bed. It had been an exhausting day, with lots of group training both as Voltron and with the simulations inside the castle. He didn't sleep more than five hours at the best of times, but he felt like he could pass out for a week. As he was finally starting to drift off, a faint rustle sounded near his door. Keith's eyes immediately snapped open and he grabbed his knife from its place under his pillow. As he inched towards the sliver of light under the door, he relaxed a small bit when he saw a small slip of paper lying on the floor. Bending down to pick it up, he noticed the shadows of a pair of feet hurrying away. Looking down at the paper first, Keith's heart skipped a beat when he noticed that it was actually an envelope with his name written on the front in blue cursive. His knife clattered to the floor, but he barely heard it. He walked back to his bed, sitting down as he shakily pulled the contents out and began to read.

 

Keith,

With you bearing with me through all of these letters, I figured it was high time I wrote you one of your own.  
First of all, I know you're already tired of me thanking you for what you did, but too bad! I seriously can't put into words how grateful I am for you mailing those letters. No one has done something that amazing for me in ages. I will say, I was a little surprised that it was you, but I guess I shouldn't be. I should realize by now what a good person you are. You knew how much I miss my family, and more importantly, you cared about it enough to do something. That meant the world to me, but I'll stop about that now because I still have about a hundred sheets of paper left in my room and I will use all of them before I'm finished thanking you.  
I'll be the first to admit, we had a rough start. At the beginning of this whole adventure, I thought we would drive each other crazy before the whole thing was over. I guess there still is time for that, but before I jinx us, I have to say that I care about you a lot, Keith. You're incredibly smart, determined and passionate about what you believe in. Although you can be stubborn at times, I know you have the best intentions. I'm so lucky to have you in my life, and the fact that we've come so far since we first met is fantastic! I wouldn't trade our relationship for anything, and that's saying something, considering I've seen so much more of the universe at this point. Which I guess brings me to the whole point of this letter.  
Truth is, over the past while, I've been starting to think of you as more than just a friend.  
I know it's weird and risky, but I honestly think we could work that way. We've watched each other's backs so far, and I personally think we make a great team, both on and off the battlefield. To be completely honest, the whole war thing scares me and that's kind of why I'm writing this letter. If the worst possible thing happens, at least I got to tell you all of this. I understand if you don't feel the same way and we can forget that this ever happened if that's what you want, but I hope that you will at least be willing to try this out and see how it goes. So what do you say? Will you give me a shot?

Lance

 

Keith sat frozen on his bed, reading and re-reading the letter in his hands. A warm sensation was spreading through his body and his breath caught in his throat. At this point, he didn't care about the future, he didn't care about what could go wrong. He just wanted to see Lance. He sprinted out of his room, the letter fluttering to his floor. He reached Lance's room in under a minute and didn't even wait to knock before opening the door. Lance himself was in his bed and he shot bolt upright as the door hissed open, his headphones flying off of his ears. His eyes widened to see Keith, who was now very self conscious about having run over in just his t shirt and boxers.

"Uh, hey," Lance stammered, suddenly feeling an overwhelming urge to hide under the covers.

"Hey," Keith gasped, chest heaving. He wasted no time hurrying over to him, crawling onto Lance's bed as the door shut behind him. "I, uh, got your letter."

"Oh." Lance pushed his blanket off, sitting next to him. "You don't have to answer right away if you-"

"I like you," Keith blurted out, nerves numbing his skin. Lance turned to him, eyes wide and a hint of a smile forming on his lips. "A lot."

"Really? Like as in-"

"Yeah."

Lance's shock faded into his trademark smirk. "Well yeah, I mean who wouldn't, right?"

"Oh shut up," Keith snickered, nudging him with his shoulder. He kept his side leaned up against Lance's bare shoulder, savouring the touch. "I'm going to regret this, aren't I?"

"Oh absolutely," Lance replied without a second thought, shifting to the side to look at him. "I'm going to drive you crazy."

Keith smiled, looking into his eyes as his heart beat frantically. "But the best kind of crazy," he heard himself say, quietly.

Lance chuckled. "Yeah." Their foreheads brushed gently and Keith felt Lance's hand rest on his shoulder. He could feel Lance's breath on his face and glanced down at his lips, the smile fading slightly from them. Keith swallowed nervously, almost forgetting to breathe as Lance was getting closer. Before he could think clearly enough to lean away, Lance's lips met his. All panic washed away from Keith's mind as he melted into the sensation, how soft Lance's lips were, his grip starting to tighten on his shoulder. As Lance pulled away, Keith opened his eyes, not remembering that he had closed them in the first place. Their foreheads still rested together, and Keith gazed up at him, eyes half closed. It was too brief, too careful for his taste and with his defences crumbling, he wanted more. Lance opened his mouth to say something, but Keith cut him off, surging forwards and catching his lips again. Lance's eyes widened and he almost fell backwards before pushing himself back up quickly, running a hand through Keith's hair. Feeling a tongue swipe across his lip, Keith moaned into Lance's mouth. Smiling into the kiss, Lance slipped his tongue into Keith's mouth, savouring the noises flowing from his mouth. Keith's back hit the mattress and he blushed a dark red as Lance moved to kiss a trail down to his neck. He let out small breathy whines as he pulled Lance closer, his fingernails raking across his back and tugging his hair as the boy latched onto his collarbone.

"Lance," he moaned as tongue and teeth scraped the hollow of his neck and the boy's hand slipped under his shirt, fingers skimming over his skin. Keith arched his back and Lance let out a groan, moving back up to his mouth. He kissed him slowly, lazily, and Keith drank in every second of it. Finally pulling back after a moment, Lance propped himself up on his elbows, his face flushed dark and only inches away. Keith leaned forwards and gave him a last peck on the lips, but Lance leaned back afterwards, brushing the long bangs away from his face.

"Did I ever tell you that your eyes are the most beautiful thing I've ever seen?"

Keith's face flushed an even more brilliant red as he simply replied, "No."

"Well," Lance continued, pausing to press a kiss to his forehead. "They are."

Keith almost stopped breathing. All of his doubts started trickling back into his mind. This couldn't be real. "Don't say things like that," he muttered, leaning up on his forearms.

Lance leaned forwards, flashing a wide grin as their foreheads brushed. "Can't deny what's true, gorgeous," he murmured, his breath hot on Keith's face.

"Stop," Keith whimpered, shutting his eyes tightly.

"Keith...hey." He felt a hand on his face and opened his eyes to see Lance now looking concerned. "What's wrong?"

Keith swallowed hard, tears stinging the corners of his eyes. _Oh no. Don't cry, don't you dare, not in front of him._ "I-" he choked out, horrified by how fragile his voice sounded. "I have to go." He pushed himself up off of his elbows and was about to leave the bed before Lance tightly grabbed his wrist.

"Hell no. You've gotten away from me too many times," he told Keith, gently but firmly. "C'mere," Lance whispered, pulling him back down and tucking them both under the sheets. He pulled Keith close and pushed a hand through his thick hair, stroking his scalp. "So," he started, keeping his voice low. "What's wrong?" Keith covered his face with a hand, but Lance reached over and pulled it away, tilting his chin up so their eyes met.

"I-" Keith began, his voice faltering. "I don't want to have to let you go," he muttered, his legs drawing closer to his chest as he tried to look anywhere but at the boy in front of him.  
Lance's eyes widened. "Why would you have to...hey," he said gently, leaning closer. Keith tentatively glanced up as Lance brought their lips together again. It was slow, sweet and tender, and Keith sighed into it, a few tears rolling down his cheek as he let himself relax. Their legs tangled under the blanket and Lance continued to gently stroke his hair. When they finally broke apart, Keith let his eyes open lazily to see Lance smiling fondly at him, one hand resting on his cheek, his thumb stretching out to wipe away the tears. "Keith, starshine. _Mi amor_. Babe. You don't have to worry about me going anywhere."

Keith hesitated, avoiding his eyes and turning his face towards the pillow. "You don't know that."

"Hey, I know for a fact that I won't die on your watch, you're too good at saving my life," Lance replied, squishing his face as flat to the pillow as possible, trying to maintain eye contact.

"It's not just that. You...you could have anyone in this galaxy, and you've flirted with half of the aliens we've met anyways. There's no way I stand a chance." Keith looked up to see Lance looking at him as though he had completely lost his mind. "What?"

"Did you see any of those aliens deliver letters to my family? Did you see them in my room, talking to me about said family and making me feel better than I have in months? No. Also have you seen any aliens this beautiful? Just look at you!" Lance laughed, giving him a kiss on the cheek.

"But it might not-" he stammered, blushing at the compliments.

"Keith, do you want this to work?" Keith tentatively gazed up at him and nodded. "Good, so do I. We can make it work." Lance told him firmly, his eyes focussed but sparkling with excitement. Keith sniffled, wriggling closer to nestle in next to him. He let out a sigh as Lance pressed a kiss to the top of his head, holding him in his arms. "I guess the tables have turned," Lance murmured into his hair. Keith glared at him.

"So you do remember, you asshole."

"How could I forget?" he laughed, gently ruffling Keith's hair. Smiling into Lance's neck, Keith drifted off to sleep, feeling the bonds on his fears start to loosen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOO! WE'RE DONE! Thanks to you guys for reading through the whole thing, all the kudos and comments warm my heart. I'm going to be working on a new mega Voltron fic *cough* Walking Dead AU *cough* and I'm super excited!  
> Also have a bunch of Klance one shots coming because good lord we all need some fluff!  
> Hope you dudes are having a good day!


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